


Pleasure Over Propriety

by Alethia



Category: Generation Kill
Genre: Erotica, Graduate School, Internet, M/M, Nate POV, Originally Posted on LiveJournal, Podfic Available, Porn, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-06-11
Updated: 2009-06-11
Packaged: 2018-05-11 12:59:39
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,117
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5627443
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Alethia/pseuds/Alethia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"People on the Internet are writing porn about us..."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Pleasure Over Propriety

**Author's Note:**

> This story is based on the fictionalized characters in the HBO miniseries, _Generation Kill_ , as written by Ed Burns and David Simon and as portrayed by Alexander Skarsgard, Stark Sands, and others. It is a work of fiction ergo it never happened.
> 
> A long-delayed gift to [](http://bijoux.livejournal.com/profile)[**bijoux**](http://bijoux.livejournal.com/) , who had a very specific request. Many thanks to [](http://shoshannagold.livejournal.com/profile)[**shoshannagold**](http://shoshannagold.livejournal.com/) for the thoughtful beta. Thanks also to [](http://hackthis.livejournal.com/profile)[**hackthis**](http://hackthis.livejournal.com/) for long-ago beer recommendations. This might be considered breaking the fourth wall. Or crack. Possibly both. Originally posted [here](http://alethialia.livejournal.com/374712.html).

It took Nate a moment to realize that no, the high-pitched strain of "Copacabana" was not in his imagination; he really was hearing it in the middle of his Economic Analysis of Public Policy class.

He'd turned the ringer off. 

Nate frantically rustled through his bag, but in his periphery he could already see Professor Wilborn watching him. No doubt with an irate, you-will-die expression firmly in place.

Nate had seen the professor's reaction to others' phones. He was assured of this.

He finally found the damn thing and thumbed off the sound, but not before the unmistakable triple-beep of an incoming text message rang out, just to add that last touch of perfection.

The world hated him. Or, more specifically, Brad did. 

"Something urgent to which you must attend, Mr. Fick?" Wilborn asked haughtily.

"No, sir. I apologize. I turned that off."

"And yet, still we were graced with the strains of such timeless music. I think since you've already interrupted us you should at least indulge our curiosity about what takes precedence over this class."

Nate blinked at him.

"Would you care to read it to us? Come now, you wouldn't leave us to wonder for all eternity. Doubtless it will be illuminating. Why, I'm sure it will even ease your mind. It must be something of singular importance." Wilborn gesticulated as he made his points, delivered in an indulgent tone, just to dig that much deeper.

Nate didn't respond. This wasn't about _him_ , after all.

Or possibly his participation was required, given Wilborn's expectant look. "No? Nothing to say? Perhaps you'd like a classmate to read it for you? I'm sure Mr. Darby would be perfectly willing." He gestured to the student to Nate's right, as if in an offer of aid.

Nate grudgingly opened his phone and clicked on the text message. Or, rather, text messages, _plural_. Four of them. 

Fuck.

He cleared his throat. Brad's texts tended to be brilliant, profane, and hilarious. Nate very much enjoyed them, but they weren't exactly fit for general consumption, most especially not for innocent civilian ears. 

Of course Brad couldn't call him at a convenient time, when he might be able to talk. 

Nate immediately banished that thought. This wasn't Brad's doing. Brad—who was currently assigned to the Royal Navy in England and who'd invariably get sent to fight in Iraq again while Nate sat safe in classrooms all day—Brad could call him whenever the fuck he wanted. Nate preferred the calls to the silence, even if the silence might be easier in some ways. 

Nate never was one for taking the easy way.

"People on the Internet are writing porn about us..." Nate trailed off, but his momentary lapse was concealed by the sudden wave of laughter from his peers. 

Nate looked a challenge at Wilborn, who simply peered at him like he hadn't actually considered the text might say anything more banal than, "beer at my place?"

Obviously Nate's professor had never met the fucking Iceman. 

The class quieted and Wilborn gestured for him to continue. "I do believe they call that a shot across the bow." Oh, really, was that what they called it?

Nate sighed and flicked his eyes back to the now-hated little screen, determined not to get himself into any more trouble. Goddamn Brad and his goddamn timing.

"These buck-toothed, limey ass-grabbers, whose presence is forced on me despite my protests, invariably—" 

Nate clicked over to the next message and continued reading. 

"stumbled across it during a flailing Google search for deviant porn. Instead they found tales of the grand adventures of my magical dick. You're there to be—" 

He moved to the next one, curious despite himself.

"conflicted, like the pussy Ivy bitch you are, but apparently your pretty little mouth makes up for it. The fucktards have now papered my rack with musings on all—" 

Nate felt his cheeks get hot. Christ, would this never _end_?

"the filthy things we do to each other. You're impressively flexible. I'm appropriately deified. This is all Rolling Stone's fault."

That last sounded a bit ominous to Nate, though he knew it a ploy to get him to call. Brad did that when he wanted to talk. Mostly the tactic amused Nate.

Nate was not amused.

Neither was the class, given that their snickering had devolved into uneasy silence. 

Wilborn looked positively peaked. "Well," he said, seeming to grasp for words—itself a first. Nate would tell Brad, but—he had a couple other things to say before that. To put it mildly. "That certainly illuminated us as to the company you keep. I suggest you turn the phone _off_ , Mr. Fick. We wouldn't want to give your classmates any more material with which to do Google searches of their own."

Indeed.

***

Nate didn't want to turn on his phone after that class, but he did because he'd led twenty-three guys through Iraq with no supplies, no clear purpose, and a company commander who wanted to charge him with insubordination for being good at his job. On a scale of doing things he didn't want to do, turning on his phone didn't even register.

Nate's past self excelled at shaming his present self. As unfulfilling as the warrior's life turned out to be, he could never get rid of the niggling doubt that coming to Harvard had turned him soft.

He had five new text messages and a couple missed calls. All from Brad. No voicemails, of course. Those were 'inefficient.'

_Now you've turned off your phone. You're missing out on some real brilliance._

Nate smiled. He could just hear Brad's tone of voice, see the unimpressed look on his face. It hit him then, that familiar wave of nostalgia for days when he could just wander around in the dirt and dust and eventually end up in a conversation with Brad. Which he did. Every damn time. 

_Those pictures Reporter included in the book have inspired a generation. There's much praise for your mouth. It's apparently very pretty wrapped around my cock._

Nate felt heat crawl up his neck again. He furtively looked around, but beyond the usual trifecta—people ignoring him, recognizing him, or checking him out—no one showed any heightened interest.

He shook his head at himself. No one could read these, yet there was still something vaguely obscene about strolling through the Harvard campus reading text messages in praise of his mouth as applied to Brad's cock.

Maybe he should worry that it was only _vaguely_ obscene. And not at all off-putting.

But then, he knew why. Most days he could ignore the want settled heavy in his gut. Less so when Brad was in a mood, sadly.

_You really shouldn't leave your laptop on and connected to the Internet. That's just bad security._

Nate missed a step. Fuck.

He thumbed to the next one.

_Did you know your calendar has zero personal appointments? All organizational and business. And reminders to pick up dry cleaning. No friends to play with, LT?_

Nate's heart sped up as he mentally catalogued everything on his computer, what incriminating evidence Brad would inevitably find. Financial info—Brad wouldn't care. Drafts of his book might pique his curiosity a bit more. The porn was a given, but nothing likely to spark Brad's interest.

_I left you a present._

Oh, dear _God_.

***

Brad's idea of a present left much to be desired. Nate's printer output tray was full of, of—well, porn. Of the written variety. And every time he tried to move the cursor on his laptop, a new page popped up, linking to yet another story. Nate couldn't help but skim some things. A sentence, a paragraph, maybe. Plus, there was a whole novel in the printer, which was blinking merrily at him that it was out of paper. 

No shit.

His cell vibrated in his hand. Gee, who could that be?

"This is your idea of a present?" Nate asked in lieu of a greeting.

"It's educational," Brad replied primly.

Nate scoffed. "On just what topic am I educating myself?"

"Computer system vulnerabilities. Possibly sexual positions, but we'll get to that."

"'Get to that?' Don't you have anything better to do?"

"Better? Not at the moment."

"Royal Navy's got you hard at work, I see," he muttered, trying to move the mouse cursor again. More stories popped up. Who the hell had time to write this much?

Brad's amused silence made Nate stop, rewind, review what he'd just said.

"That was—an unfortunate word choice," Nate forced out.

"Been reading, have you?" Brad asked with quite a bit of relish. Like he wanted to _talk_ about this. 

"I don't like you," Nate said evenly. "Do you even know what you put me through today?"

"I could think up some scenarios, if you'd like." The way he said that...it offered and insinuated and _presumed_ all at once. Something tingled at the base of Nate's spine. 

Nate shoved it aside, as usual. He would not let Brad get to him.

"I've got enough here, thanks. I don't even know what to do with this. I mean—porn? Written about us?"

Brad hmmed in answer. "Rolling Stone will be thrilled he's spawned his own sub-culture. And you're hardly blameless."

"What did _I_ do?" Nate asked, annoyed.

"Beyond looking like that, you do recall the part where you wrote your own book?" Brad's tone turned fond. "Living for months in that puffy-eyed haze. With the redlining, the criminally ignoring my brilliant suggestions, the Corps eighty-sixing all my best quotes. It was rather memorable."

'Looking like that?' What did _that_ mean? 

"Good times," Nate said, thinking. Then realization hit. "Fuck, they read my book, too?"

Brad tsked. "Here I thought you'd appreciate the attention to detail."

"Scouring my book for details to include in their fantasies about you and me fucking?" Nate asked, parrying his dry tone right back at him. Why wasn't Brad outraged about this? He seemed...amused. Playful. That in itself sent Nate grasping for solid ground, distracted by the desire that never seemed to go away.

"At least you got some money out of it. I, on the other hand, am compensated not at all."

"Except the boon to your reputation as a Nordic sex god," Nate muttered.

Brad huffed out a laugh. "You make a fair point. Perhaps I did get the better end of the deal."

Nate let that hang in the air for a long beat, unimpressed. "I'm not making the anal sex joke."

Brad chuckled darkly into the phone, deliberately provocative. "But you thought it and that's all I require."

Require for what? What the fuck? Nate shook his head and looked at the disaster that was his laptop. Not only was he clueless about what Brad did, he had no idea how to fix it. So how should he start the conversation with someone who _could_ fix it? "This is so wrong."

"I direct your attention to page fifty-two of the novella in your printer. Now _that's_ wrong." Brad sounded rather approving of that fact.

"Let's talk about how many trees you just killed for something I'm not going to read. You're deforesting the planet."

"Ah, but you forget: some find it virtuous to exploit the fuck out of Mother Nature, especially in service of pleasure." Brad's voice rumbled on the last and Nate shivered despite himself.

"I should probably...get back to what I'm supposed to be doing." Did he kind of trail off there? Sound too hesitant? Was he showing Brad how easily he could get to Nate? Well, people on the Internet wrote porn about him and his closest team leader; Nate was so sorry he hadn't spotted _that_ one coming and prepared eloquence in advance.

"I cleared your calendar for you," Brad said promptly.

Wait, what? "You cleared my calendar?"

"I deleted all this week's entries," he clarified. "It's wonderfully sparse."

Lovely. His computer organized his life. Thus his immediate future held frantically trying to recall that one very important appointment he _knew_ he had...after he'd explained to the nice computer repairman why the only thing he could access was porn. About himself.

Now Brad was just being sadistic.

"Can't wait to see it after I dig myself out from under all the purple prose. And don't _you_ have something to do right now?"

"Me? I have to knock on this door."

"I'm sorry?"

Nate's question was drowned out by the measured knocking coming from his front door.

He looked at the phone in his hand, then at his completely uninteresting wood door, then back to the phone. He started when the knock sounded again. Nate pressed the phone to his ear as he stood and walked over, not exactly caught up with the facts on the ground.

"It's quite rude to leave guests waiting on doorsteps, you know," Brad scolded in his ear.

Nate opened the door. "Brits teaching you proper etiquette?" he asked into the phone, even though it was now superfluous. Given that Brad stood _right in front of him_.

"Their manners are vastly overestimated," Brad informed him primly. And smirked. 

Brad, the real Brad, thumbed off his phone/PDA/music player/space shuttle controller and hefted his bag onto one shoulder. He surprisingly wore civvies—boots, jeans, Harvard shirt Nate had sent as a joke and that now looked rather lived-in, leather jacket, totally wrong for the weather but ridiculously hot—and then Nate mentally shook himself for wondering about clothes when Brad was _here_.

"You're really at my door."

Brad tilted his head and eyed him. "Have many hallucinations where I show up at your door? Fantasies, maybe?" His smile was downright predatory.

Nate needed to be dealing better. But.

"You're at my door."

Brad's smile softened as he stepped close. "We can take care of that. Gonna invite me in?"

Nate's _whole body_ lit up. He hastily shuffled back and out of Brad's way. Brad's smirk said he hadn't missed that, but he breezed by Nate without a word.

Well, fuck.

***

Just like every other visit, the sheer space Brad filled kind of stunned Nate a little. Not that he claimed much in the way of territory—neatly dropping his bag by Nate's couch and kicking off his boots in a move that shouldn't be physically possible—but in his presence everything else faded to mere background noise. 

Nate boggled at the visceral effect Brad had on him, even after all this time. He shut the door and followed Brad in, a little annoyed with himself. Couldn't this go away already? He was an adult for Christ's sake, not some lovestruck pre-teen. But one look from Brad and Nate was ready to drop everything, drop his dignity, drop to his knees...

Okay, he really needed to avoid that thought since it wasn't going to happen. Nate knew this. Nate accepted this. Mostly.

Besides, if it were going to happen, it already would have. Brad took what he wanted; he wasn't exactly timid. So Nate could just get over this ridiculous...thing. 

Brad tossed his jacket over the back of the couch as he sank onto it, digging in his bag for something. Harvard crimson never looked so inviting as when faded and stretched across those shoulders.

Nate forced his eyes away from the sight.

Brad produced a bottle of Scotch and inspected it. Safely tucked inside its box—looked like a nice one—it'd made the trans-Atlantic trip unharmed. He deposited it on the coffee table with little fanfare. "For later." Then he went back to his bag.

"Still big on ceremony, I see," Nate said.

Brad snorted. He made a pleased sound in the back of his throat—Nate's eyes flicked to his face involuntarily, then quickly away—and he slapped a stack of pages next to the Scotch. His hand disappeared again and returned with more. 

A kind of dawning horror gripped Nate's gut at sight of the growing pile. 

"You printed it out?" He approached the coffee table and took a stack of pages, fingering the edges. "On the inbred, bastard child of legal and letter-sized paper."

"Sophisticated paper," Brad corrected. "Besides, it's the English; you should expect inbreeding. It's a time-honored tradition, far too refined for we backwater, whiskey tango Yanks to comprehend." 

"I'm still back at the part where you printed it out."

"It was a long flight."

Nate's hand went tight; he dimly heard some pages crumple. There was only one way Brad would get from Plymouth to Boston. "You spent your military flight reading gay porn?"

"Erotica. You're beginning to disappoint me, Nathaniel. The Ivy League is making you sloppy."

Nate ignored him in lieu of flipping pages. Dog-eared pages. With scribbling in the margins. "You underlined things? You wrote notes?"

"Anything worth doing is worth doing well," Brad intoned, depositing the last of it on the coffee table and relaxing back. He steepled his hands behind his head and sprawled, a king in his castle, lord of his domain.

Those jeans fit him far too well.

Nate wet his lips and focused on the pages in his hand, at Brad's neat, block-lettered observations: "Not physically possible," he read aloud. "Not as enjoyable as it looks." Nate turned the page in a kind of glazed awe. "Not something any good girl would know. Nice."

He looked back to Brad, still claiming the couch as his birthright, but amused now, like Nate was earning his keep as court jester. 

So long as _someone_ was having a good time...

"Why aren't you appalled by this?" Nate asked.

"Why are you?" Brad's expression didn't change at all, but his eyes held...something. It was that kind of look that made hope churn through Nate's gut, that brought all the want right to the fore. 

Nate thrust out the papers still in his hand, maybe a little bit roughly, like they should explain everything. Which they should. "Gay porn. You and me. Invasion of privacy, defamation of character...bad goddamn manners."

Brad's grin was shiny and white. "More with the manners. You're fucking adorable when you get all worked up about something."

His indulgent amusement effectively derailed Nate's rant. Nate dropped onto the couch next to him and tossed the papers across Brad's lap. "Nice argument."

"You lost your status as a private citizen when you published a book about your time in the Corps. Besides, imaginary scenarios don't constitute an invasion of privacy. You'd have to prove damages for this to rise to actual defamation, and as for bad manners, what were you planning to do? Tell their mothers?"

"I don't like you," Nate stated firmly, staring at the ceiling and feeling oddly out-of-depth. 

Brad leaned a little closer, lowered his voice. "And yet you like the naughty things I do to you."

Nate flushed. Sometimes Brad's teasing was just cruel. It wasn't deliberate, but that hardly mattered. 

He met Brad's eyes and pressed on. "What I do not like is getting your text messages in the middle of class. My professor made me read them aloud. I guarantee you a whole cohort of the Harvard Business School will have Googled this crap by the end of the night."

Brad shrugged and sat back. "You silver spoons gotta get your kicks somehow."

"It shouldn't have even happened; I turned my ringer off," Nate protested, knowing it was weak.

"Amazing things, computers. You can always write a little code, add a little loophole."

Nate straightened when his brain made the connection. "You hacked my phone? _Why_ would you do that?"

"Because I could." Brad smirked, completely unconcerned. "Plus, I have a lot of free time. I figured you might have incriminating pictures."

Nate flushed some more. "I don't."

"I know that now. Shame," he added, thoughtful. Then he turned wicked. "We should take some. I'm sure we can find a suitably scandalous scenario somewhere in here." He waved at the papers in his lap, on the table.

His skin must be bright red by now. "Think I'm gonna pass on that offer, generous as it sounds."

"Killjoy."

Nate huffed out a laugh and shook his head. "I am impressed by the theatrics. Phone ringing in class. Provocative text messages. Showing up just as I got your gift. Need some attention, Brad?"

"I'm simply sharing the love. Don't you want to feel the love, Nate?" he asked crisply, some kind of anticipation showing through. The words were flippant and could be taken as a joke, but something bothered Nate; Brad was being awfully persistent here. 

"If by 'the love' you're referring to sticking your tongue up my ass...I think I'm good." Nate tried to go for mildness of tone. It might not have worked so well. But what could he do? Frankly, he couldn't quite believe they were having this conversation. In the flesh. In his grad school apartment. 

All by themselves.

Brad shook his head sadly. "You're missing out. I have a superlative tongue."

"With which I've seen you flay even the toughest of Marines," Nate allowed, careful.

"I was speaking literally," Brad said, looking at Nate's mouth. His eyes flicked up to meet Nate's. "But yours works, too."

That was—Nate didn't know what the fuck that was. Subtle, it was not. Joking? It didn't _feel_ like joking. It felt more like an offer...but that didn't square with his understanding of reality.

Nate decided distance was a good plan. He levered himself up. "I need a beer for this. You want?" he called back as he headed for the kitchen.

"Yes, I will accept the dog piss you colonials call beer," Brad said loftily as Nate breathed in the cool air of the fridge, "but am prepared for the inevitable disappointment. Beer is one thing the Brits know how to do."

Nate rolled his eyes and contemplated grabbing the true blue English 'biscuits' Brad had sent a while back, but then decided that might be taken as encouragement. Instead he simply popped the caps and left them to spin on the kitchen counter.

Brad raised an eyebrow at the label as Nate handed over his bottle. "Kronenbourg; I like it. Patronizing the Brits' sworn enemies. You're learning such classy ways to say 'fuck you.'" 

"To higher education," Nate said. He clinked Brad's bottle in a mock toast, then fell back onto the couch with a sigh.

Papers crinkled under him, a reminder of Brad's little gift.

Brad seemed to latch onto that, too. "Did you get the opportunity to read much?"

Nate almost choked on his pull. "No, thank you. Not interested." He wiped at his mouth, something to distract from the lie. 

"Don't you want to know what they say about you?" Dammit. Why was Brad incapable of letting things go?

"It's not real, Brad. It's fantasy, about two people who don't exist." Nate swallowed around the tightness in his throat.

"Who have our names and wear our faces."

"Exactly." 

Brad studied him for a moment. "Then why are you so flushed right now?"

Nate shook his head, at a loss. "What do you want from me?"

"Nothing you don't want to give."

Nate rubbed his forehead. Something about that struck him, but he couldn't quite pinpoint the reason. Giving. Brad leaving him a present. Something...

But wait. Why would Brad be giving him presents? Sure, this was a taunt, but a legitimate gift wasn't unheard of—the rugby ball on his desk, the Scotch, hardly the first bottle to make its way here, the biscuits in his cupboard, the Fick family crest that hung on the wall...

Nate stared at the white Harvard logo stretched across Brad's chest. He supposed he wasn't innocent there, either. 

Brad's voice caught his attention; it sounded strange. "Funny thing. One day I wandered back to my rack only to find every fantasy I'd ever had printed out and waiting for me. And then some."

Nate blinked at him slowly, mind processing—had he heard that right?

Before his brain could cycle through anything more sophisticated, Brad was on the move—depositing his beer on the coffee table and crawling the short distance to where Nate sat. 

Nate had never frozen before; it was kind of a novel experience. One small part of his brain wanted to analyze the feeling. The majority, however, was shocked dumb by the realignment of reality, by Brad up in his personal space, taking Nate's beer out of his hand, arms coming back to frame Nate, braced against the couch at his back.

"What are you doing right now?" Nate asked, blank.

"C'mon, LT, you're smarter than that," Brad said silkily. Then he leaned down and brought their mouths together. 

For two badass motherfucking Marines—especially if Brad's Thai whoring exploits were to be believed—the kiss was strangely chaste. Closed-mouthed, firm, but not pushing for anything more. It might've gone differently if Nate's brain weren't stuck contemplating the image of Brad crawling across the couch, but he supposed that was Brad's due for pulling _this_.

Nate's hands wrapped loosely around Brad's biceps, completely of their own volition. Brad took that as some kind of signal because he broke the kiss then. Nate breathed in. He had no idea what to say here, but Brad seemed to have a plan; he angled his head a little more and leaned in again. The second kiss had their mouths open and breath mingled, but was still rather reserved, like they were feeling each other out.

Just another way this didn't make any sense. Since when did they do that? 

What the _fuck_? The comments, the teasing, the goddamn _looks_ —they weren't unknowing? They weren't unintentional? That was Brad's way of showing interest?

"Motherfucker," Nate hissed. He gripped Brad's arms and bit at his mouth. His body got with the program, flushed hot, keyed up to fight or fuck, he didn't quite know. 

Brad groaned against his mouth. "Problem?"

"Years, Brad. I've been going out of my mind for _years_." He crushed their mouths together, suddenly horny as hell and pissed off about it. Brad immediately licked into Nate's mouth, like he'd been waiting for permission to begin his all-out assault. With that, all hesitance was just _gone_ ; they devoured each other, tongues tangling as each struggled to gain the upper hand.

"Wasn't just you," Brad panted against his mouth sometime later. 

"Oh, fuck you. You couldn't have jumped me any sooner?" He scraped his teeth down Brad's chin, then bit at his neck.

Brad exhaled roughly. "Wish I had." He pulled back and caught Nate's mouth, thoroughly distracting them again. Nate's cock _ached_ ; Christ, it felt like he'd been hard since before Iraq.

Brad dropped his weight down and settled his body against Nate's. They both groaned at the feeling, haltingly dry-humping as their tongues tangled—wet and aggressive and filthy. Sweat broke out at the small of Nate's back. His fingers gripped the crimson sleeves of Brad's Harvard shirt, about five seconds or one good grind from ripping the damn thing off.

Brad pulled back on a quick grin, then started biting his way down Nate's neck. "Knew you'd be like this," he muttered against Nate's Adam's apple. Hands started tugging at Nate's sweater, at a belt loop, trying to shift his position and strip him at once.

"Fuck," Nate hissed. The sharp bite to his collarbone sent heat flooding straight to his cock. He moved at the urging of those tugs and ended up with Brad's hand palming his cock through his pants. Brad pulled up so that he half-kneeled over him, lips wet and shiny, hand teasing him without remorse.

"A fine idea," he said as if in agreement...to what, Nate hadn't a clue. "Lose the sweater," Brad ordered. Heat aggressively swept through him at that. Jesus. 

Nate pushed himself up a little so he could pull it over his head. Naturally the damn thing wouldn't cooperate. His wrists got tangled, then something got stuck somewhere when it was half off, material pulled tight just under his jaw—

Brad's hands unbuttoning and unzipping Nate's pants froze him for the second time ever. The fact that he couldn't see, breath hot in the confines of his sweater, that he couldn't move, everything lost importance as compared to those hands releasing Nate's painfully hard cock. Brad's hand closed around him, stroked once, and Nate gasped, getting a mouthful of cloth for the effort. Brad chuckled and stroked again, fire coiling tighter in his belly.

"Need some help, LT?" Brad asked, his voice awash in amusement. Then he squeezed and Nate didn't even _pretend_ he had enough brainpower to answer. Or keep hold of the strangled moan that slipped out.

Brad, damn him, stroked him slowly with one hand and tugged at the sweater with the other. Before the sweater was even fully off, Brad started kissing him again, deep and wet, somehow managing to extricate Nate with little difficulty.

Fucking Brad and his fucking competence.

Nate moaned into Brad's mouth and thrust into his grip and tried to ignore the way a little part of him had thrilled in the confines of the sweater. Jesus, now was not the time.

But his hands' freedom meant he could touch and Brad helpfully shrugged out of his shirt, revealing endless still-tanned skin to explore. Nate couldn't seem to settle, dragging curious fingers down Brad's chest, around to where the tattoo sprawled across his back. Nate's fingers stole past the waistband of Brad's jeans, fingering the soft skin of his ass. 

Brad nipped at him.

"Finally getting the attention you want, Brad?" Nate asked against his mouth. "Why does that not—oh, _fuck_." Brad gripped Nate's cock, intent now, stroking faster; the pleasure took him apart much too quickly. Nate hadn't had sex in a long time. He could already feel the orgasm threatening.

He pulled his hand away from Brad's ass and made a sincere attempt to get at Brad's cock. But Brad kept twisting just perfectly on the upstroke. His fingers seemed to be everywhere at once: teasing his slit, rolling his balls, pressing firmly just behind. Nate couldn't keep control of his hands.

Or his body, which was straining to get more of Brad, in whatever way it could no matter how shameless. He was goddamn keening and couldn't give two shits so long as Brad didn't fucking stop. He made more noise, only half-muffled by Brad's mouth on his. 

Brad pulled his mouth away and Nate sucked in a gasp. Oxygen hit his system, wash of pleasure right on its heels, and he was _done_. His hips jerked as warmth flared bright, straight down his spine and to his cock until he was coming and coming, gasping as the world receded until it was just him and Brad and something like bliss.

Brad, thank fucking _Christ_ , stroked him steady and firm, eyes on Nate's face through it all, taking in everything until Nate's vision shorted out and he couldn't watch Brad watch him.

Floating his way through post-coital blankness seemed to go on for a lot longer than usual. Fuck, he'd missed that feeling.

His senses came back like a steady rising tide. First his hearing—he was panting, his breath loud in his ears. So was Brad. 

Then touch—Brad wiped him off with something, gentle. It still made him moan.

Then sight—Nate's eyes dropped to where Brad was hard and straining against his jeans, cock clearly outlined against the fabric. That had to be uncomfortable. 

He shook off the stupor and cleared his throat. 

"What do you—" Nate paused as the vast array of possibilities flashed through his mind, culled from what little he'd read and years of trashtalk...and was he ready to go there?

Brad smiled tightly, like he knew what Nate was thinking. He nodded at the scattered papers. "Need some inspiration? I think we have enough reference material," he said, light.

And like that the tension broke. Nate breathed out his laugh and grabbed the nearest page, only half-serious. He scanned it quickly, amazed that just the thought of someone else writing this could make him blush, even now, half-naked and sweaty and panting against Brad.

He met Brad's curious look. "Blowjob," he said, succinct.

Brad's eyes dropped to his mouth like he couldn't help himself.

Nate licked his lips; Brad blinked slowly. He let the page fall, then shoved himself out from under Brad and sank to the floor. 

Brad stayed very, very still. He might not even be breathing.

Nate sat up on his knees and tugged at the closure of Brad's jeans. "It seems you weren't joking about the praise for my mouth on your cock," Nate said as he carefully unzipped the far-too-tight denim. 

Brad's fingers ghosted across his mouth; Nate looked up.

Brad had an odd look on his face; it made Nate's chest go tight. "It is a superior mouth," Brad said. His thumb pressed against Nate's lips and Nate parted them, took in that thumb, sucked lightly. He nipped at the pad and felt Brad's cock twitch through the fabric of his briefs. 

Nate grinned, predatory. He freed Brad's cock, then unceremoniously took him in his mouth. Brad made some sound—obscene, unclassifiable—and Nate looked up, sucking just at the head of his cock.

Brad didn't blink, like if he let his eyes shut for even a nanosecond, Nate would disappear into the ether. Nate simply held the look and sucked harder, gratified to see Brad's hand curl into a fist and pound the back of the couch once. The hand he still had on Nate's jaw cradled him carefully. A study in contrasts, that was Brad.

Nate experimented with depth, going down on Brad in increments, seeing how much he could take, what made Brad start and shudder and moan loud enough to have Nate blushing. 

He wrapped his hand around the base and set up a counterpoint between his mouth and hand, a rhythm that soon had Brad's thighs tensing under his forearms. A finger pressed back behind his balls as Nate's tongue licked over the crown pushed him over the edge. Brad grunted some kind of warning and Nate stroked him firmly as he pulled off. 

He wasn't quick enough to avoid Brad shooting all over his face, though. 

Nate drank in Brad's expression, a little awed at the raw emotion there. Brad looked in thrall to pleasure so deep it pained him, something far too vulnerable flashing in his eyes. Just that brief glimpse hit Nate low, made his gut clench. Realization shook through him—Brad was in this just as deeply as Nate. 

But then that look disappeared, blinked away as Brad panted and stared down at him.

Nate wanted it back, wanted to study it, wanted to see just how deep it went. Instead he pushed his thoughts away, something to think about later. Right now he needed to focus on life's little inconveniences. Like come all over his face and chest. 

"Fuck, Brad," he groused, wiping to no avail. He grabbed the handiest thing—a couple nearby pages—and tried to get the majority of the mess off of him. It wasn't the most efficient solution; he was still sticky, but at least he didn't have come dripping off his chin. 

He folded the pages strategically and tossed them aside.

Well. Turned out the Internet porn was good for something, after all.

Brad simply sat there, unmoving, a glazed look in his eyes. Nate raised an eyebrow.

"I am going to fuck you blind," Brad said finally, clipped, like some kind of official declaration made to God or Godfather. He gripped Nate by the arm and hauled him up and onto the couch. Nate went.

***

"You didn't really delete my schedule for the week, right?"

Nate could feel Brad smile against his skin. They'd made it to the bed, _finally_ , and Nate was a little disturbed how easily he lazed against Brad like this. 

"Dramatic license," Brad said. He ghosted his lips against Nate's shoulder, a casually possessive touch. Nate liked it.

"And you'll make the porn go away." That wasn't a question.

No laugh, but Nate could feel the amusement radiating off Brad. "If you like." Another dry brush of lips to his shoulder. 

Nate hmmed and settled against him.

"The porn's not all bad. There are some particularly inventive uses of ice cream."

Nate's eyes snapped open at that. He looked askance at Brad. "I _will_ kick you out of this bed."

Now Brad did smile. "I think I'd like to see you try."

***

Fin. Feedback is adored.

**Author's Note:**

> [](http://chemm80.livejournal.com/profile)[ **chemm80**](http://chemm80.livejournal.com/) has done a podcast of this story [here](http://chemm80.livejournal.com/143344.html).


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